Who wants to adopt KAB?
by Paul Baron
posted on 2008-08-07 at 14:08 in KAB News
Kansai Art Beat was originally launched in April 2007 after the Flanders Center in Osaka partnered with Tokyo Art Beat in a venture that was to bring TAB's successful website and software to the Kansai area.
For 15 months, Flanders Center did a great job at linking with more than 300 local art venues, and its team of bilingual editors listed more than 5400 events (that's 360 a month!).
Unfortunately, the Center decided to put an end to the venture prematurely to refocus on its core activities as an event organizer and Flemish culture promoter in Japan. We thank them for their amazing effort and motivation that lead to the birth of KAB and wish them a happy future.
We also want to thank the Kansai-based venues for their support and hope to bring KAB back to life soon to continue promote their events to the more than 30,000 people checking the site monthly.
So KAB is now looking for new parents. In concrete terms, the Art Beat network is now looking for a new organization to take over the responsibilities of the Flanders Center and bring back KAB to life and join the Art Beat Network with Tokyo Art Beat and New York Art Beat.
The basic requirements to run KAB include:
* find, train and pay staff (a couple of part-time editors, 1 full-time PR person, 1 part-time manager)
* creat friendly relationships with Kansai-based venues (300 listed and counting)
* translate and list their events on KAB
* actively promote the website around the Kansai region both offline and online
* sell banner advertising on the website
The new parents of KAB will receive support from the Art Beat Network team, including website maintenance, feature updates and work with KAB on potential Japan-wide promotional campaign for events or internal projects such as TAB's successful yearly collection of artist t-shirts or advertising campaign with outside partners.
The successful applicant organization should fit those criteria:
* be based in the Kansai area
* show a proven track record of involvement in culture-related activities in Japan
* be ready to take on the costs associated with the running of the site until it becomes financially sustainable or profitable.
* be a non-profit organization like TAB (optional)
Benefits and pleasures of running KAB for new parents:
* be at the center stage of the art and design scene in the region
* run a great community website with the platform, and help from the people who made Tokyo Art Beat and New York Art Beat
* be part of a growing network of great web sites, bringing the best of creative culture to cities worldwide
* Pay (almost) nothing for the platform and keep (almost) all the revenue
KAB is an essential promotional platform to broadcast Kansai's creativity in Japan and abroad and we hope to find applicants who share our hopes and motivation.
If you are interested in hearing more about it or want to become KAB's new parents, please contact us : contact@kansaiartbeat.com
